10-Yard Fight*
You're the quarterback in this amazingly real football game!
Enjoy realistic grid-iron action as you move your team up and down the fields to victory! Run, pass, kick, punt - you call the plays in this true-to-life football game. Play against the computer, or against a friend, for hours of real football action. The sights, the sounds and the players are so real, you'll think you're right on the fifty yard line!

Players: 1 or 2

For use with the Nintendo Entertainment System

Overview by Michael Collins

10-Yard Fight is about as simplistic as football comes on the NES. As you can probably tell from the screenshots, gameplay doesn't revolve around advanced play-calling, strategy, and perfectly-timed trick plays. Rather, 10-Yard Fight is what its name implies: fighting for ten yards by simply breaking enough tackles. Repeat the process enough times and hopefully you'll find yourself in the end zone.

Customization isn't a big part of this game. All you'll really get in the way of options is a difficulty setting: high school, college, professional, playoff, or Super Bowl caliber teams. Graphics and sounds are just as minimalistic, but considering the time period, they are quite average.

Review:

As the overview states, 10-Yard Fight is a pretty basic game, even for an early NES game (which is a port of a 1983 arcade game). It is also the one of the earliest NES games I have memories of playing, and I have to say, I didn't understand what was happening. Of course even at ten, when the NES was released in my neck of the woods, would I have called myself a sports fan. Though I do have to say that this never stopped me from playing it at my friend's house. Also this game has one of the coolest and possibly most romantic names for the sport of American Football. I mean, 10-Yard Fight makes it sound like chess or something. Hey, told you I wasn't very football-y.

While there are many options in the game to choose from at the start, they really amount to how quickly the computer sacks your players. At "High School Team" you have a nice fighting change; at "Super Bowl Team" you may need to focus on breathing exercises to keep from chucking your controller. With that in mind I have a suggestion: Don't play this game single-player. Find a friend, plug in another controller, and play it together, because that is likely the only fun you'll have with this title.

10-Yard Fight plays like what it is: An early NES sports title ported from an even earlier arcade game. There are only two offensive plays to make (three if you could punting, which you shouldn't as you don't have control over when to do it) and the players run at what seems to be a snails pace. While it was certainly fun back in the day, it just can't stand up to the test of time, especially with games like Tecmo Bowl and Tecmo Super Bowl more readily available, and about the only things 10-Yard Fight has on those games is simplicity and a lower price point.